Frost Wizard

I came up with this idea of a Frost Wizard Build, and would like to hear your thoughts on it.

I'll clarify some of my choices here aswell, hope you like reading!

Ray of Frost

I took Ray of Frost with a Golden Runestone in order to reduce it's Arcane Power Cost to zero. As of now we don't know if Blizzard really wants this Spell to cost nothing or if it is a Bug, but considering the Runed Spell Name being Cold Blood, i assume that they want it to cost nothing.

Also with Patch 13, this Spell slightly got changed. Sadly the Talentcalc. is not up-to-date.

As you can see, the damage Buff and the reduced cost make this a fairly good spell, in combination with my other choices ofc.

Blizzard

This spell is going to be my main Nuker as many of you thought already. I have chosen to use an Alabaster Runestone to increase Blizzards critical chance and add the effect to freeze enemies.

Blizzard costing 45 AP per cast, and assuming there will be absolutely no items that increase AP, will leave me and my Arcane Power pool pretty low at times.

But as of now, we all can only speculate about +AP or +AP/s items. So please skip talking about this.

(Edit: Those Items are already in the Beta, and will most probably make it to the Endgame)

Frost Nova

As of today's Patch, Frost Nova will no longer deal Weapon Damage, that i am aware off.

But what i plan is using it in combination with an Alabaster Runestone, which, if you hit 5 targets, freezes them in place for 3sec and raises your critically hit chance by 30% for 12 seconds!

This spell is going to be used, whenever i feel the need to save me or my group from damage, aswell as the need to give myself a neat buff in damage.

Storm Armor

I have chosen to use Storm Armor in combination with my Abilities. Basic Storm Armor deals damage to ranged and melee attackers. An Alabaster Runestone in it will also add the Ability to hit nearby enemies for 116% weapon damage, whenever i critically hit. Well it says that there is only a chance that Storm Armor will really do it, and i'm afraid i don't know how high this chance really is. But changing the Armor or swapping it out completely is not really a big deal.

Diamond Skin

I have chosen Diamond Skin for the obvious reason to mitigate Damage, even after todays nerf to this spell. Overall this spell is still good in most situations. It only has a 15sec cooldown, and absorbs alot of damage. I picked an Indigo Rune this time, even though i believe that it is not the best choice, and that an Obsidian Rune would be better fitting. But i guess that i will find out when playing this Build.

Familiar

My last choice was taking in the Familiar in combination with a Crimson Runestone. The Familiar itself will deal a little bit of Arcane Damage, but more importantly boost my damage by 30% !

Though Blizzard nerfed the passive Glass Cannon to 15%, i believe that they will Nerf the Familiar as well.

As for my passives, Black Ice for the obvious Reason to increase my Ray of Frost's and Blizzard's damage by 20%. This Buff and Familiars Buff will greatly improve my damage output.

I took Galvanzing Ward to give my Storm Armor a neat side effect, which regenerates 890 life per second.

My last choice was Astral Presence, as explained earlier why.

This Build is made for playing together with friends and/or random people.

The idea behind the Build is to use Ray of Frost as the main damage dealer when out of Arcane Power. Whenever it is needed, i can throw my Blizzard down onto the enemies, and deal damage. Whenever i get hit i can use Diamond Skin, to survive those nasty attacks while those attackers suffer from Storm Armor. When i feel the need to run or to get some extra damage, Frost Nova comes in handy to freeze one or more enemies, and increase my critical hit chance by an amazing 30% for 12sec!

In certain situations i can imagine swapping out the Familiar, to get Slow Time or Teleport. Depending on the enemies the enviorment, the group i am playing with, or the Boss.

Same would go for Frost Nova.

For example, playing vs a Boss without any kind of Minions, i have no need to have Frost Nova in my spells, as it deals no damage, and the Boss would most certainly be immune to Freeze. And without hitting 5 targets, i have no need for Frost Nova.

Well, in the beta we can see the new Skill Runes, and while RoF won't be 0 it's like 4 or 5, so we'll still regen while casting it with that rune. so it's certainly useable as a main skill, the only issue with it, is later on you may need to be moving too much to get to cast it that long, but that's not too big of an issue either because you'd still be regenning AP.

It's not speculation, there are items that can increase your AP, and regen AP upon critical strikes. We have them in the beta, and I don't that they will take them out for release.

I wouldn't use blizzard as a nuke, even though it got a buff to damage, which was nice, it's still not as much as say Meteor with Obsidian to make it comet.

From what I've seen all the runestones are still there but now as Skill Runes, but not quite how I remember them all, so we'll have to wait and see about that one. It's lame cause in the beta you can only look at the Skill Runes for skills you've unlocked so we don't know about most of them yet.

For group play it's not too bad, but it's not amazing either, I don't imagine that resistances will be too high, probably no higher than 75% in inferno, so you will be alright there in a group, but solo you'd be doing too little damage if that was the level of resistance, but we don't know what that will actually be yet so I wouldn't worry about it now. Seems like a fun build,

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Thanks for the answere!
I was afraid that people can't be arsed to read through all of my thoughts, which is quite understandable hehe

I considered taking Comet instead of Blizzard, but i saw my role in the group more of dealing damage while keeping the enemies in some sort of control. The way Blizzard is Runed, it will freeze enemies aswell, which will reduce overall damage the Group will take.
But taking Comet for Bossfights for example is something i might do.
I guess changing the spells in an out, if you fail to kill a Boss, is not such a huge deal.

Also thanks for clarification on +AP and +AP/s items, i wasn't aware of those items being in the Beta.
Knowing that there will be such items, i can play even more around Builds!

I really like this build. It is very close to what I am considering. Only change i suggest is looking at blur instead of your final passive. After seeing a few of the videos floating around of people getting smoked in NM, I think defensive talents will be a a premium. That being said you could also consider changing to crimson runed energy armor for the resistance buff + your choice of passives for a little more defense.

I don't think Galvanizing Word is so strong, probably the numbers in site are broken.
Diamond skin + 1 armor spell is too much defense if your build isn't for PvP.
And last imo 1 signature spell is a must for spamming purposes.

I don't think Galvanizing Word is so strong, probably the numbers in site are broken.
Diamond skin + 1 armor spell is too much defense if your build isn't for PvP.
And last imo 1 signature spell is a must for spamming purposes.

Well Galvanizing Word, i doubt that it will be considered so strong in lategame.
The numbers on the spells are for max level characters anyway.
Usually a Beta player has about 300HP or even more, so i can imagine that lategame heroes will have a quite high hp pool, and 890hp/s won't be that much. Also i'm not sure if the hp regen is smaller during combat.

I checked your Build as well, and could imagine in certain situation replacing Diamond Skin with Archon Crimson Rune, but it all depends on what spells i will be able to use with Archon and how well they will work with my Build.

I really like this build. It is very close to what I am considering. Only change i suggest is looking at blur instead of your final passive. After seeing a few of the videos floating around of people getting smoked in NM, I think defensive talents will be a a premium. That being said you could also consider changing to crimson runed energy armor for the resistance buff + your choice of passives for a little more defense.

I considered taking Energy Armor as well, but it would not work with my Build. Besides that, you will get resistance from Intellect and Items you are wearing.
I will use Energy Armor with an Arcane Build i have come up with.